21st century feminism

Wednesday, 3 March 2010

seriously... every frock, heel and cardi counts?

I came across this classic piece of sizing up the wives to measure the men. This time it's Sarah Brown and Samantha Cameron in light of the coming UK election.

I would like to say that I’m shocked by it, but I’m not. It’s in the air. It seems there is an unspoken assumption that the wives need to raise their game for their husbands to gain additional political advantage. Are they slim enough? Are they well dressed enough? Are they independent enough? Are they motherly enough?

I love Michelle Obama, but I’m afraid that all we have imported from her incredible story, is the desire to have a sassy, well dressed wife as a freebie with our (male) head of government. Someone to go round the girls' schools and encourage them to aspire. One day they too could marry a powerful man...

Personally, I’m looking for the women actually in government, rather than the ones married to it. We have some wonderful female MPs, but they only make up 19.5% of elected members of parliament. Where we rank on the international scale is a sobering read.